Ag Talk | We don't think larger towns are saturated yet, Vinay Bopatkar

The garment industry in India is an extremely fragmented industry. With some of the best designers, manufacturers and suppliers of garments, this industry has carved a niche for itself in global markets.

With the changing preferences of consumers in buying branded apparel and fashion accessories, there has been a boom in the retail industry with people shopping from malls, department stores, discount stores and online stores. Online shopping has seen a lot of growth in the last couple of years and this industry is growing at a rapid pace.

As per the Technopak reports, the domestic Apparel market in India is worth Rs 207,400 crore in 2012 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 9 per cent over the next decade. In the same, Van Heusen is one of the largest players in this market with a market share of 26% in the premium apparel segment.

In our quest to know more  about the Brand, the latest collection, marketing strategy and their digital efforts we at Adgully caught up with Mr. Vinay Bopatkar, COO, Van Heusen.

Adgully (AG): Can you define your Target audience?
Vinay Bopatkar (VB): The core audience of the brand is - successful, sophisticated, multi-faceted professionals, both men & women, who are conscious of making their presence felt. They pursue success just as they do their other interests and passions, learning and exploring everything that comes their way. They believe that style is as important as substance.For the Van Heusen customers, elegance and style are not just fads, but a philosophy.

AG: How has been your growth in India?
VB: Van Heusen was introduced to the Indian consumers 25 years back. Van Heusen, not only has had the unique distinction of establishing the brand, but in this journey, we have also developed the ready-to-wear category in India.  Today we are one of the largest premium apparel brands for professionals and the most trusted source for the latest in fashion trends.  The brand is looked up to as an expert voice on what to wear, when to wear it and how to wear it.

We are roughly a 1500 crore (at MRP) brand, growing at a CAGR of 22% for the last 5 years. We are present across the length and breadth of the country; across 120+ cities through our exclusive brand outlets and over 1000+ cities through departmental stores, multi-brand outlets and e-commerce.

AG: Tell us something about your marketing strategies (both online and offline)?
VB: The brand embodies the positioning, ‘POWER DRESSING’. Van Heusen customers are the corporate leaders for whom elegance and style are not just fads, but a philosophy. Thus the Van Heusen range is modern, minimalistic and timeless in design and is distinguished by high quality. Van Heusen with its distinctive and fashionable range of products helps the corporate leaders create their best impact, as much for his style as for his substance.

Van Heusen has always been at the forefront in the apparel industry by enabling its customers look stylish - be it through its exclusive and trendy designs or through the various product innovations over the years. This brand has always believed in constantly doing something new.

AG: What is the concept behind MY FIT?
VB: Through extensive consumer research and insights acquired through an in-depth understanding of consumer behavior indicated that almost one in three consumers walked out of the stores empty handed because they didn’t find what they were looking for. We found what these consumers liked didn’t exactly fit them or wasn’t available in their size. When it comes to sizes, mainstream fashion brands offer limited size options, that too only in even sizes like 40/42/44. If someone wants middle size, or someone falls on the either side of the spectrum, they are left in the lurch. Often consumers wish to alter just a bit of the design elements so that the garment truly reflects their own style, which is not possible. Even the rest 67% who make a purchase, live with some of these compromises. This understanding of the compromises that consumers make while buying readymade apparel; is what inspired Van Heusen to launch MYFIT.

Van Heusen MYFIT is an innovative solution that helps consumer break all these compromises and gives the power in their hands to find a garment that truly fits them - fits to their unique body or to their unique taste. We are offering 6 different body types, 13 size options from 37 to 54 including middle sizes. So much so, that if someone has a longer or shorter arm-length than the regular, we can tweak the sleeve length to precisely match the requirement. Consumers can also select from a slew of styling options like French-cuf, Chinese-collar etc. Consumers can avail our MYFIT offering either by walking into any of our 250+ stores across India or visiting our official online store www.trendIN.com. All the facilities of online shopping are available including cash on delivery and the convenience of getting the apparel delivered at the convenience of one’s home or office.

AG: What are efforts to blur the line between physical and the digital world?
VB: Indian consumers are rapidly evolving and Digital is becoming the way of life. We recognize this fact and therefore, we are working on several ideas to integrate digital to provide our consumers an omni-channel experience. MYFIT is the first step in this direction. We have built MYFIT with offline – online integration at its core. To develop this solution, we had to completely revamp our manufacturing process as well as sales processes. We have also integrated MYFIT front-end with our online store TRENDIN. Consumer can buy MYFIT shirt or trouser online at TRENDIN.com or at any of our 250+ Exclusive brand outlets (EBOs). MYFIT has all the facilities that a typical online model offers like getting delivery at home/office as well as Cash on Delivery with the offline experience of trying the garment and getting touch & feel of the actual fabric.

There are several other ideas on offline-online integration that we are currently working on which we will announce at the opportune moment.

AG: Do you see decline in your offline stores viz-a-viz your online store?
VB: While there are a lot of discussions about online business eating into offline footfalls, we need to be alive to the fact that fundamentally it’s about the consumers and finding a relevant solution for their needs. As marketers we have to enable them to shop in whichever manner they are comfortable with and build distinct propositions for each channel.

Today our observation has been that while there is a shift happening about how people shop, the consumer profiles for both the channels are different.  Online channel today is more about price discovery and appeals to customers with a certain mindset. Offline is more about experience. Understanding these differences and aligning our strategies to the same is helping us increase the overall share of the pie.

Also, for brands like us, providing access to consumers has always been a challenge. While we have built a pan-India brand, we are still available only in 120 cities through our exclusive stores. However, through TrendIN , in the last 2 years we have been able to serve consumers across 1000+ cities. Thus instead of eating into footfalls, TrendIN has helped us increasing the brand penetration in towns where it is difficult for us to be present in full glory. Today we can actually map where the actual demand is coming from and tweak our expansion strategy accordingly.

AG: How best are you using the digital space? Do you intend to get into the App space?
VB: We have been doing a lot of experiments on this platform. Last year we ran a digital-led contest to give our consumers a chance to walk the ramp for Van Heusen. We associated with LinkedIn to create a unique consumer engagement idea called Most Fashionable Professional contest. We have been extremely active on other Social Media platforms like Facebook & Twitter. Also, we have been running a few experiments with Google to engage with our consumers. These campaigns have done exceptionally well in-terms of consumer engagement as well as response.

AG: Do you see saturation in the bigger towns and hence trying to focus on smaller markets?
VB: We don’t think larger towns are saturated yet. We are well penetrated in these towns. However, there’s a large untapped potential in smaller towns. And hence, we are focusing on increasing our reach in these towns. However, we will continue to expand in larger towns depending on opportunity particularly for our newer extensions like Van Heusen Woman and VDOT

AG: What kind of media mix do you use?
VB: Our media strategy is largely-led by Print media. However, off-late our spends on Digital media and CRM has grown significantly.

AG: What innovations do you see in the apparel industry?
VB: There are a lot of innovations that are happening in the category – both in terms of business model as well as in terms of product. MYFIT is about business model innovation. We do see a trend that more and more brands will start integrating their offline & online platforms to offer consumers an omni-channel experience.

Last year we launched an innovative range called ‘Travelog’ which was focused towards the needs of a business-traveller. We have created this range by combining our understanding of consumer need and the knowledge of fabric technology. We have worked with renowned partners to resolve the common issues related to travelling like wrinkles, stains, sweat-mark, odour etc.

Recently, we have launched another innovative product called EasyWash Shirts. The USP of this product is that it doesn’t catch stains easily. Even if it gets stained the same can be easily removed in regular water without using Detergent.

We have also launched a range Denims which can remove stains when left under the sunlight – useful for bikers and trekkers. We see such trends continuing. By Archit Ambekar | Twitter: @aambarchit